Mathematics Department Seminar Talk - Daniel Goroff

Daniel Goroff, Vice President of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, will present a Mathematics seminar talk titled "Poincare and the Great Chaos Scandal".

Abstract: Henri Poincare lived in France at the turn of the 20th Century and invented much of modern mathematics-including what has come to be called "chaos theory." How this happened is a story full of surprises. It starts with studying pendula, planets, and other dynamical systems whose motion seems familiar and predictable. After many mistakes and missteps, the whole idea of what it means to solve a differential equation changed.